Canku Ota

(Many Paths)

An Online Newsletter Celebrating Native America

February 8, 2003 - Issue 80

"Cama'i"

The Alutiiq Greeting

Means "HI"

The Gray Month
(When trees are bare and vegetation is scarce)

Pima

"Remember to live a good life, and do good things with each day that you are given. Help each other and encourage each other to be good people. "
~Joseph Flying Bye~

We Salute
Columbia

We introduce another of our regular contributors ... Timm Severud (aka Ondamitag). Timm researches the history and natural history of northwestern Wisconsin. In the past, you have seen his articles about "Float Copper," "Birch Bark Scrolls," "Pipestone Quarries," "Menominie Forestries," and numerous articles relating to the history of his home area.

Artist:
Joseph Flying Bye

Joseph Flying Bye - Kangi Hotanka was a pejuta wicasa (medicine man), akicita (decorated war veteran), and wakan wicasa (holy man or spiritual healer) from the Hunkpapa tribe of the Lakota / Sioux Nation on the Standing Rock Reservation.

He spent much of his early years helping his blind grandfather prepare medicines and pray over sick people. He would often lead his grandfather into town and listen to the old men talk of battles and life on the open plains. His grandmother would also tell him creation stories at night and in these ways he became a keeper of traditional knowledge and culture.

Cherokee Nation Gives More Than $1.2 to Public Schools

The Cherokee Nation announced the distribution of more than $1.2 million to public schools in the Tribe's 14 county jurisdictional area.

The money comes from the sale of Cherokee Nation car tags over the past year. Under Cherokee Nation law, the tribe gives schools within its jurisdictional area 38% of the revenue generated from the sale of Cherokee Nation car tags. The tag revenue only goes to schools whose district lines are within the Cherokee Nation's 14 county jurisdictional area because the Cherokee Nation only sells tags to Cherokee Nation citizens who live with its jurisdiction.

Thunderhawk - The Great Cross Country Adventure - Part 3
by Geoff Hampton

Writer Geoff Hampton shares this story that should delight both young and old.

Dairy of C. H. Cooke on a Canoe Trip up the Chippewa River in the Spring of 1868
submitted by Timm Severud (Ondamitag)

The diary kept by C.H. Cooke of Mondovi during a canoe trip made by himself, George Sutherland, and Captain Shadrach A. Hall, principle of the Old Eau Claire Wesleyan Academy, up the Chippewa River in the spring of 1868, gives a detailed picture of valley and its life at that period not duplicated by other writing known to exist. The third installment will appear soon.

Explorer's Club: Science Program for Reservation Children

Explorer's Clubs are on four reservations in San Diego County: Pala, Jamul, Campo, La Jolla. The purposes of this free monthly program are many: nourish interest in love of outdoors, introduction to outdoors science as a career, share the values that protect the earth, and to provide outdoors scientists as role models. The program is the brainchild of Dr. Eleanora (Norrie) Robbins, a geologist who retired in 2001 from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in the Washington, DC area. She is now adjunct faculty at San Diego State University.

Baker Lake Youth Gets Bitten by Travel Bug

Baker Lake (Jan 29/03) - Participation in the Nunavut Youth Abroad program this past summer created an appetite for all things fresh and new for Nadia Aaruaq of Baker Lake.

Aaruaq, who is currently attending a folk school in Greenland, spent the summer of 2002 in the Canadian Phase of the NYAP at Port Perry, Ont.

She spent the majority of her stay working at an elder's guest home.

Learning that the Sky's the Limit

Astronaut John Bennett Herrington shared the power of possibilities with nearly 1,000 students at Chief Leschi Schools on Friday.

It was his first public appearance since a two-week Space Shuttle Endeavour mission that brought a flight crew back to Earth from the International Space Station last month.

As a member of Oklahoma's Chickasaw Nation, Herrington is NASA's first tribal member in space.

Uplifting Success, Burning Failure

We were gathered on Friday evening, January 27, 1967 at the Mousetrap in Cocoa Beach, a favorite watering hole for Cape Canaveral personnel. The TGIF crowd noise was deafening. Everyone but me seemed to be ignoring the television behind the bar. I could see news that looked like trouble at the Cape, so I asked the bartender to turn up the volume. Soon the crowd began to notice the broadcast, and the Mousetrap hushed as everyone gathered to watch the announcement.

Blackfeet Tribe Immerses Students in Language to Counter 'Manifest Destiny'

"Tsa nii ksistikowatts sa-ahsi?" teacher Shirley Crowshoe asks her class of elementary students sitting in a circle on a thick rug in a bright, modern classroom. "What kind of day is it outside?"

Jessie DesRosier, 13, is quick to raise his hand: "Sugapii ksisko, ahstosopo," he says. "Nice day, cold wind."

Jessie is one of a handful younger than 60 in the 15,000-member tribe on this isolated reservation who can speak its native language.

Mohegans Revive Heritage Through Language

Despite the fact that Bruce Bozsum grew up in Montville, where his family has lived for hundreds of years, as a teen-ager Bozsum took only a limited interest in his Mohegan heritage. It was easier to pass as white.

"I distinctly remember hearing stories from my parents when I was young, stories about locals treating our people as if we'd disappeared off the face of the earth, refusing to acknowledge our culture," Bozsum said, with a shrug of his shoulders. "Except for the times when someone would call us 'dirty Indians.'"

Indigenous Peoples of Alaska

I want to tell a story of the Indigenous Peoples of Alaska. It is a story seldom told, yet needs to be heard. The survival of Indigenous Peoples and the future of mankind depend upon stories such as this reaching the leaders and youth of the world.

Our place as human beings in the world is out of balance. Through our greed, fear, and over-consumption, we have hurt many relationships between one another and our relationship with the earth. Our path as humankind needs to be altered to incorporate values of respect, unity, and balance.

Alaska Native Heritage Center and Bridge Builders Celebrate Diversity in Anchorage

The Alaska Native Heritage Center (ANHC) has joined with Bridge Builders to celebrate diversity and community on Saturday, February 1, 2003 from 12PM to 5PM at the ANHC. This is one of the continuing series of Celebrating Culture Saturdays sponsored by BP.

"We are part of a rich and diverse community in Anchorage," stated Lonnie Jackson, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer.

Woven in Tradition

FARMINGTON For decades the white man's civilization has tried to break the spell of silence many Native Americans have regarding their culture and customs.

For some, this has meant trying to understand sand paintings and the woven chants depicted in those paintings.

"Everything kind of ties in with our history," said S.P. Martinez, a Din medicine man who this week revealed some of the mystery behind the Woven Chants exhibit now on display at the Farmington Museum.

Choctaw Basketball Coach Experiences Success at the Jr. College Level

When Nick Durant took the Women's Basketball Head Coaching job at Carl Albert State College five years ago, he knew he was in for a challenge. After all, the Junior College program had been on a proverbial downslide for a while.

But Durant, who is Choctaw Tribal citizen, was willing to get to work. Durant knew the price of success would be high, but so could be the rewards.

Keeping a Tradition Afloat

The scene from the shore looking southeast over Agate Passage was something out of a different century.

With arms and paddles rising, then in unison sinking into the glassy waters below, about two dozen members of the Suquamish Tribe marked a chapter in an ongoing return to tradition.

"We were a canoe people," said tribal chairman Bennie Armstrong as he watched the growing parade of canoes from the shore near the Suquamish Tribal Center. "This is bringing us back to our ancestral highways."

TC High School Hogan Project Nears Completion

As the completion of Tuba City elder Rena George's new hogan is getting closer, members of the TC community are providing visible proof that affordable, culturally sensitive, permanent housing is not only possible but is an extremely doable project that could assist any Indian reservation in the United States.

This includes the six agencies who sponsored the model project — Tuba City High School, Tuba City Chapter, U.S. Forest Service, Navajo Housing Authority, Coconino County Supervisor Louise Yellowman, and ICE (Indigenous Community Enterprise).

Home on the Range for the Buffalo

In the 1870s, buffalo hunting became a popular Kansas tourism magnet, attracting gun-toting visitors by the trainload, and eventually leading to the near-extinction of the four-legged beasts on the Great Plains.

A century later, renewed proposals by ecologists to re-introduce thousands of wild bison to potential wildlife preserves in Kansas or other Plains states could stimulate a new tourism bonanza.

Chief Sky, Now Blind and Helpless, Tells Story of "Old Abe," War Eagle

Lac du Flambeau, Wis. - Blind, helpless and tortured by rheumatism, a wrinkled and picturesque old Indian who helped to make civil history is rounding out his four score years, awaiting the call of the Great Spirit, in this little Chippewa village in northern Wisconsin.

He is 'Old Jackson."

Alaska Native Heritage Center Celebrates ELIZABETH PERATROVICH DAY

The Alaska Native Heritage Center is celebrating Elizabeth Peratrovich Day on Saturday February 15th, 2003 from 12pm to 5pm. Admission is free. The day will be a celebration of the lives and accomplishments of Elizabeth and Roy Peratrovich in the arena of civil rights in Alaska. In addition, ANHC will be honoring Dr. Peter Gordon Gould, Aleut, who was the first Alaska Native ordained Methodist minister and founder of Alaska Methodist University (AMU), now known as APU. This is one of the continuing series of Celebrating Culture Saturdays, sponsored by BP, which presents a unique cultural program each week.

About This Issue's Greeting - "Cama'i"

Cama'i, a traditional Alutiiq greeting, is a friendly, welcoming word used much like the English term "Hi." Cama'i you might say as you meet a friend on the street or enter a room full of people. The Alutiiq continue to greet each other with this familiar word. To many it symbolizes pride in Native culture and a continuing respect for Alutiiq - the traditional language of Kodiak, Prince William Sound, the lower Kenai Peninsula, and the Alaska Peninsula.

Alutiiq is one of six Eskimo languages spoken in Alaska and Siberia. It is most closely related to Central Alaskan Yup'ik, the traditional language of the Bering Sea Coast, and speakers of Alutiiq and Yup'ik can converse easily. Within Alutiiq there are two distinct dialects and many smaller regional variations in vocabulary and word pronunciation. Residents of the Kenai Peninsula and Prince William Sound speak Chugach Alutiiq, while residents of the Alaska Peninsula and Kodiak Archipelago speak Koniag Alutiiq.

Today there are less than 500 fluent Alutiiq speakers, although many more can understand the language. Alutiiq communities are working hard to preserve their language. Speakers are helping linguists write dictionaries and develop lessons that can be taught to school children, and many consider language preservation the most important goal of the heritage movement.

This Date In History

Recipe: Valentine's Day Treats

Story: Origin Of The Groundhog Dance

What is this: Groundhog

Craft Project: Valentine Crafts

Opportunities

"OPPORTUNITIES" is gathered from sources distributed nationally and includes scholarships, grants, internships, fellowships, and career opportunities as well as announcements for conferences, workshops and symposia.

Canku Ota is a copyright © 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 of Vicki Lockard and Paul Barry.

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